"Oh my God," she sobbed, her entire body shaking, "I love you. I love you." Johnston looked from her precious doll to 15-year-old Aliyah Austin and back to the doll, repeating the words in broken cries. "I love you. I love you."

Grinning ear-to-ear, Austin held Johnston’s hand, assuring and reassuring her the doll was her very own, to keep and love forever.

Austin is a member of the Dolls for Dementia charity, founded by 15-year-old Emily Richey, also of Paris, in an effort to bring love and laughter to the lives of patients living with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.

As Emily stood before several dozen community members at Legacy Health and Rehab on Thursday morning to explain to the people of Fort Smith just what the charity means to her, she recounted the tale that first sparked her interest in helping dementia patients.

When Emily was a small girl, she visited her great-grandmother who suffered from dementia, excited to show off her brand new birthday stuffed animal.

"She took on to it, and she loved it, and she decided she wanted to keep it," Emily laughed. "At the time, I didn’t really understand why, and it didn’t make a lot of sense, but last summer I started researching … and I found something called doll therapy."

Doll therapy is a growing dementia care technique that shows extensive ongoing improvement in social interaction and communication in dementia patients, according to studies published by the Social Care Institute for Excellence.

"I decided I wanted to create an organization that would bring other dementia patients like my great-grandmother the same kind of joy she got to feel through it, so I created Dolls for Dementia," said Emily, who has given away 120 weighted, therapeutic baby dolls and bears this year.

"It’s really amazing, and we see their reactions, and it shows that what we’re doing really is making a difference," Emily added.

Richey and her parents, Jason Richey, a Paris physician, and Tracy Richey often tell the story of a patient who reached a true breakthrough because of the program

"She hadn’t talked, probably in years," explained Jason Richey, who saw her monthly for more than 15 years. "She would mumble and maybe say a few words, but not really make any kinds of meaningful speech."

"When we handed her the doll, a big smile came across her face," continued Emily, "And she said, ‘Does this doll have to leave with you?’ We said, ‘No, you can keep it.’"

"She couldn’t stop talking about how beautiful it was, so it was a true breakthrough with her," Emily said with a grin. "That was one of our really big success stories."

"I told her, ‘This lady never talks, this lady never smiles,’" said Jason Richey, "And we see that over and over — that people who never smile start smiling, that people who never speak say a few words. … And for us to see it in our small community, it’s just been everything we’ve dreamed it would be."

Jason Richey went on to explain that as a doctor when he gets calls saying a patient is agitated or anxious, the first response usually is, "Let’s get them medication."

Now in a couple of the facilities where the dolls have been distributed, the response is, "Hey, why don’t you give them their doll?"

"It calms them down, so the need for medication is greatly reduced," Jason Richey said. "And that’s the purpose, to give them something to live for and dream for and take care of and to reduce any type of agitation or aggressiveness that they normally would experience. It’s just a doll, but it makes such a big difference to their health."

The Richeys’ younger daughters, Anna Claire, 12, and Maggie, 9, are major contributors to their sister’s organization as well.

"They come with me. They deliver dolls. They tell their friends. … (A)nd their friends help spread the word, and they’ve really learned how to approach the dementia patients and help deliver dolls," said Emily. "I feel like it’s really brought our family closer. We’ve been able to come help our community together, and they’ll carry it on when I graduate."

Dolls For Dementia partnered with the Frank and Barbara Broyles Foundation run by Betsy Broyles Arnold and Molly Arnold Gay, daughter and granddaughter of legendary University of Arkansas coach and athletic director Frank Broyles. The pair has distributed more than 800,000 copies of their dementia caregivers guide, "Coach Broyles Playbook for Alzheimer’s Caregivers," internationally.

After the groups spoke to Legacy visitors, Dolls for Dementia presented 10 dolls to Sparks Regional Medical Center Senior Care and Valley Behavioral Health Golden Options for their own distribution and invited those who would like to witness the cause in action to follow them to the dementia wing of Legacy Health and Rehab.

As the patients were given their dolls, each took his or her new baby with a caring touch and loving smile.